NASA's Dawn mission to study two of the largest objects in the asteroid belt, Vesta and Ceres, has begun. Lying between Mars and Jupiter, the two very different bodies offer clues to planetary formation.

The craft will arrive at Vesta in 2011 and
the dwarf planet Ceres in 2015.

In addition to being the first to orbit two solar bodies, Dawn is also powered by unique ion propulsion system briefly described by Scientific American in its story on the mission.

The C|NET piece on Dawn also contains a number of nice images. You may find the images seen here at NASA.

September 27, 2007

In this recent image of Saturn, Dione (1,126 kilometers, 700 miles across), Enceladus (505 kilometers,
314 miles across) and Mimas (397 kilometers, 247 miles across) are visible left to right. Click to enlarge.

Cassini is headed for an October 2 close encounter with Titan and will be able to take another look at the surface of the moon.

September 26, 2007

Jeff Foust, the man behind a favorite web log of mine, Personal Spaceflight, has published a piece in The Space Review on NASA administrator Michael Griffin's current view of the "space economy," its impact on the larger economy and the balance NASA must strike between its historic role as the nation's space agency and an emerging space industry.

While NASA has carved out a modest but relatively stable wedge
in the overall federal budget, some wonder whether that wedge is big
enough for the agency to do all it has been tasked to do, from
kickstarting an ambitious human exploration program to maintaining its
portfolio of science and aeronautics research. Meanwhile, long-term
budget pressures, particularly from entitlement programs as the Baby
Boomer generation approaches retirement, could make it difficult for
NASA to retain even its current share of the budget over the long haul.
That requires NASA to both better justify the importance of a
government space program while also seek means to work with the private
sector to do more for less—approaches that NASA administrator Michael
Griffin described in two very different speeches last Monday.

The entire Foust article is well worth the time to read and quotes Griffin from two speeches given just this Monday.

Other stories not included in the latest iteration of the space carnival include Paul Gilster's piece on Tau Ceti, which asks the question: what should the constant bombardment of potential planets in the dust belt surrounding that star tell us about the development of life on Earth?

Wiredreports that NASA's GLAST is designed to peer into every corner of the universe as well, looking for the sources of gamma-ray radiation, the kinds of fantastic energy produced by merging neutron stars, for example. Wired's science blog also links to Scientific American articles on the future of space travel and the hard choices NASA may face - funding for every worthy goal simply isn't available.

September 20, 2007

Cosmic Log: Partnering with the X Prize Foundation, Google has funded a $30 million space prize for the first privately funded lunar lander, the Google Lunar X Prize:

The new prize calls upon teams to create
autonomous rovers that could land on the moon, travel at least
three-tenths of a mile (500 meters) and send video, images and data
back to Earth.

The first team to succeed would win $20
million - that is, if the job is done by 2012. After that, the prize
drops to $15 million, and if no one is successful by the end of 2014,
the money could be withdrawn. If a second team succeeds before the
deadline, $5 million would be given as a runner-up prize. Another $5
million would be reserved for bonus tasks - for example, roving for
longer distances, taking pictures of old lunar spacecraft, finding
water ice or surviving the long lunar night.

No more than 10 percent of a competitor's income can come from government contracts. See Alan Boyle's entire article for more, including comment from other private space ventures on the announcement.

September 19, 2007

[Image credit: Geoff Oliver Bugbee. This live-blogged Michio Kaku presentation from the ideaFestival is being cross posted from the ideaFestival web log. Enjoy.]

The speaker now is theoretical physicist Michio Kaku. He holds degrees from Harvard, UC Berkeley and has offered a foundation for modern string field theory. He has authored "Hyperspace," "Time Warps" and "Parallel Worlds," popular books on physics.

The presentation starts with a thumping video of the city of the future. In 2057 the video says we'll all live in a wired world full of ambient technology.